it's so great to see you. you, too! oh, cloudy glasses. you didn't have to come over! actually, honey, i think i did... oh? you did? whoa, ladies, easy. hi. cascade kitchen counselor. we can help avoid this with cascade complete pacs. see, over time, cascade complete pacs fight film buildup two times better than finish quantum. to help leave glasses sparkling shiny! too bad it doesn't work on windows. okay, i'm outta here. cascade. the clear choice. i'm craig melvin, you're watching msnbc, the place for politics. thousands of protesters have

been filling tahrir square for days now telling their new president to leave office after he pushed through a new and highly conservative constitution. meanwhile, mexico's new president has just been sworn in and his election marks the republic return of the party that ruled south of the border for seven decades. so, what is going to change? many say the latino vote that allowed our president to secure his second term. but what is behind, what is behind the big idea of this record turn out? before we get to all of that, the fiscal cliff. we start with president obama digging in his heels about raising taxes on the wealthiest. senior administration official telling "the wall street journal" there will be no new offers until republicans allow tax rates to go up on top earners. this morning, the president accusing the gop of brinksmanship while republican senator orrin hatch said democrats are asking for too

much. >> it's unacceptable for some republicans in congress to hold middle class tax cuts hostage simply because they refuse to let tax rates go up on the weltiest americans. >> what he proposed this week was a classic bait and switch on the american people. a tax increase double the size of what he campaigned on. >> joining me now nbc white house news correspondent mike viqueira. what can you make of this? fiscal cliff talks are they a nonstarter? >> i tell you, you listen to everything that is being said publicly. you see the president there. it's clear that the election, yes, is over. but the campaign goes on here. you know, i really believe that there two things that are clear from the white house to republicans. we are still in preliminary stages here, which is the good news, considering they are far apart. number two, the white house clearly feels it has the upper hand. it came with the $1.6 billion in new revenues and that's twice what the president was talking

about before the election. republicans, obviously, rejecting it out of hand. we all heard by now republican leader in the senate mitch mcconnell laughed at it. there you see some of the provisions there. $600 billion in savings. some of it from medicare, another 50 billion in spending and new spending on infrastructure and stimulus spending. that's something that republicans aren't going to want to go to. the two sides are far apart. here we are on december 1st, the clock is ticking. if they can't come to a deal over the course of december, delay all the christmas vacations and then the nation does go over the fival cliff and some people are thinking about the unthinkable now, craig. yes, it all boils down to that tax rate and the white house is playing hardball. they are insisting that the votes are there. they are, in some cases, playing to the democratic base that wanted to see this all along in past negotiations, craig. remember two years ago when we had the same debate about extending the president's tax cuts the president caved and no one expects this to happen this time and yet the votes aren't

there in the house of representatives, especially among republicans to pass. there's some question whether john boehner would even put a bill like that on the floor. so, right now, a standoff. but that's the bad news. the good news is they have a month left to negotiate. >> mike viqueira from the white house, we'll see you again next hour. thank you. it may be the republicans biggest weapon in the fiscal cliff debate and democrats are trying to remove it permanently. this week, treasury secretary timothy geithner took a proposal to gop leaders that significantly restrict congress' authority over the debt limit. house speaker john boehner pushing back maintaining a debt ceiling increase would need to be matched by spending cuts. >> if we're going to talk about the debt limit in this, then, there's going to be some price tag associated with it. i continue to believe that any increase in the debt limit has to be aacademied by spending reductions that meet or exceed it. >> joining me now, political

anchor "new york one news" and co-editor of "scandals, tragedies and trumps triumphs." senior ederter for politics and news at yahoo! news. she has become a weekend pal. thanks for being back with us, both of you. let's start with the debt limit, we're talking about the debt limit, again. do republicans believe this is their ace in the hole? >> i sure hope they don't. i think the president has the stronger hand on this. number one, he won the election. we're all discussing that. he has the stronger hand in general. the other thing is that everybody remembers what we went through two summers ago. the summer of 2011 when the nation went through default. people felt that the president handled the situation badly, but they felt the republican congress was much worse in that particular negotiation. i don't think the republicans in trying to reestablish their brand want to get back into that fight and look like they want to have the ability to hold up the debt ceiling and then potentially bring the nation back to the edge of default, again.

>> i want to play a snippet here of what majority leader harry reid said this week said about the fiscal. >> we would be somewhat foolish to work out something on stopping us from going over the cliff and then a month or six weeks later the republicans pull the same game they did before. >> if the debt ceiling isn't addressed now, are democrats just setting themselves up for another fight in which they will perhaps be forced to make more concessions? >> they won't be forced to make more concessions, beth it has right. the democrats have a stronger hand. they're not in any position to be blamed for this. and i think the republicans learned a hard lesson, not just in the elections, but even in the previous fiscal fight, which is that it doesn't necessarily matter who's responsible, it is rather who the public thinks and holds responsible for the problem. and to the extent that you look at the election results and look at the hardline members like alan west who got voted out of

office. they're in no position to try this over and over again. >> what exists between what we're seeing play out on television. you know, all of the bluster. between that and what's actually happened behind closed doors. do we think they're probably far closer to hammering this thing out than perhaps we are seeing and hearing? >> yeah. there's no doubt a lot of activity going on behind the scenes, but there are a couple really big points of disagreement that i don't think we're going to close up any time soon. this discussion over raising the income tax rates and the republicans say they're absolutely opposed to that. president obama is making that a condition of this deal. and there's got to be some movement eventually, but republicans are going to have to give up a very big, a very big selling point there if they're going to take the president and say, all right, we'll shift rates, even not back to the bill clinton tax levels that the republicans say they don't want to go to, but even just back to somewhere close to that. >> but do you think, i mean, if we're talking, you know,

preclinton levels, we're talking north of 39%. is there wiggle room between 35% and 39%? couldn't they just say, 37% is right in the middle, 37.5% is right in the middle. >> john boehner is used to cutting deals. he has a conference that doesn't let him do it. the tea party folk have stopped him again and again and again. he made statements in the past where he had to try to round them up very forceinally and not always with great success. enough trade bait out there. the president has been out there taxing dividend income. that's something that failed when the senate tried to do it and obviously trade bait and he didn't campaign on it and he doesn't feel strong about it. >> the escape is something a lot of folks are concerned about. >> he put it out there and it could be adjusted. once you get a range, you could strike it right down the middle. there's plenty to do there. it's the politics that are holding him back. if you put boehner and the president on a golf course and let them make a deal that is binding, i think they could do it in an afternoon.

>> beth, "the new york times" reporting that the president would like to set an august 1st deadline. the plan would call for $600 billion in new revenue from revisions in the tax code. that's on top of nearly a fri trillion dollars raised on the bush tax cuts for the rich. is there support for both of these? >> both parties suggest it is a mess and too many exemptions and loopholes and that's just not, it's too complicated. it needs to be simpler and little flatter and needs to make more sense to people. getting there, the devil is always in the details. they never seem to really get to the point where they can sit down and have that discussion in a rational way. if they can get through this fiscal cliff and everybody feels that there was a negotiation that was fair and pushed the situation forward, maybe that is the next thing they can do, really consider some tax reform. >> beth, thanks, as always.

hope your book up here. >> this is for you. this is a stocking stuffer. >> thank you. >> beth? >> i know, i'll get one next time. >> thank you so much. we'll check back in with you later this hour. beth, that gives you plenty of time to run out and get me a gift, as well. to egypt now. back to egypt. members of the muslim brotherhood and other islamists rallied behind mohamed morsi. nbc's jim maceda is in cairo with the latest on that. >> hi, craig. supporters really needed a massive turnout today at their rally to stem the momentum of the opposition, which has seen hundreds of thousands of real mix of secular, moderate, leftist, liberal, christian and other minority egyptians who have been filling up tahrir square over the past week and which tonight, by the way, continues its ten-city occupation of the square. today in the end belonged to

morsi supporters. their show of support was big, at least in the tens of thousands, perhaps 100,000 or more outside cairo university and it really had the feel of a political rally. there were people waving flags, carrying banners and chanting pro-morsi sloegers. there were some clashes reported, not in cairo, but in the north in alexandria between pro and anti-morsi groups. overall, however, the day was peaceful. that's because the muslim brotherhood is much more focused on politics than on protests. it wants to see as quickly as possible the ratification of that new draft constitution. which, of course, the opposition says is completely invalid because it was rushed through an all-islamist committee and very bias towards the islamists. morsi received tonight a copy of that draft in a ceremony and in the days ahead, maybe even tonight is likely to announce a nationwide referendum for as early as mid-december. back to you. >> jim maceda in cairo for us,

thank you, sir. republicans have drawn a line in the sand as we edge closer to the so-called fiscal cliff. will democrats cross that line? i'll talk to a member of the democratic leadership. then a little bit later, new israeli settlements in the west bank. what it means for the overall peace process. that story coming up, as well. a surprising nondecision from the supreme court. that doesn't mean a high court won't take up same-sex marriage, but it does mean that we'll have to wait to find out when the high court will weigh in on the controversial issue. you're watching msnbc.

>> there's a stalemate. let's not kid ourselves.

i am not trying to make this more difficult. you watched me over the last three weeks, i have been very guarded in what i have to say. >> don't kid yourself. house speaker john boehner yesterday talking about the fiscal cliff declaring that a stalemate now exists. as both sides dig in their heels. the gop demanding entitlement cuts in exchange for revenue. nancy pelosi, meanwhile, threatening to take action to enforce a vote on extending middle class tax cuts if republican leaders don't bring it to the floor next week. want to bring in democratic congressman peter welch from vermont. congressman welch, always a pleasure. let's talk -- >> thank you. >> let's talk about entitlements here. are you willing to put entitlements on the table if republicans agree to more revenues through tax increases on the wealthy? >> yes. and the president is, too. essentially the president has made an opening offer. $1.6 trillion in new revenue from the top 2% and about $400 billion in medicare savings over the course of the next ten years. now, the next move, actually, is

speaker boehner's counteroffer, whatever that may be. he has a very tough position and my view, the speaker understands that mitt romney, who ran on the platform of not raising taxes lost and the speaker knows he has to do it. the problem is, his members ran on the platform opposing tax increases and they won. so, he's got the challenge of trying to persuade people who are against tax increases who ran and won on that platform doing what the speaker knows ultimately has to be done and that's raise revenue from the top 2% of this deal. >> correct me if i'm wrong but based on what i read and what i heard with regards to the math. if you close loopholes and limit deductions, you still cannot generate the kind of revenue that would arrive at 1.6 or even $1.2 trillion. is that correct? >> i'm not sure about that. if you do loopholes and you do tax rate increases, i believe you can -- >> rate increases, yes, but not

deductions. >> rate increases. >> so, the rates have to go up. >> that's correct. i think they do. if you want to get to the number the president's talking or even close to it. the loopholes. if we can clean up the tax code, everyone is in favor of that. making it simpler, clearer and it probably won't get us the revenue number unless what you mean by that is going into deductions that will hammer the middle class and lower income folks. obviously, that's not acceptable to the president. >> the president has said, as you indicated $400 billion with regards to medicare savings. last week senator durbin said he thought that $400 billion figure was probably going to be more of a floor than a ceiling. most folks suspect it will be higher. where else, where else can democrats find entitlement reform savings? and how much can they find? >> well, a good example, you know, in the veterans program, the veteran administration program we buy drugs, a lot of them. at whole sale prices.

and we negotiate the price discounts with the pharmaceutical companies. that's prohibited by law and medicare. if we had prescription price drug negotiation in medicare as we do in the va, we could save a couple $100 billion. there are things like that we could do that we should do and i would think and hope that republicans would support us on that would save the taxpayer money and save the medicare beneficiary person money by making a better, fairer pricing system and we would extend the solvency of medicare. so, a lot of things we need to do to bring down health care costs, not just to medicare, but in the overall system. >> there was apparently laughter in the room from senator mitch mcconnell when the president's initial proposal was presented. do you think that president obama started these negotiated on the wrong foot with that $1.6 trillion offer? >> no. you know, i actually think senator mcconnell is being pretty "redridiculous to laugh.

the laugh is really just a way to try to ridicule the seriousness of the negotiation that senator mcconnell plays a major role in. in a normal negotiation. you go in and buy a car, you're going to low ball your first offer and you're going to wait for that counteroffer. the president, he's probably coming in at his high point, but, you know what, next move is speaker boehner, senator mcconnell, what is your counteroffer? they don't want to get specific about what revenue they would be willing to raise and understandably so because they're going to have a back lash, a furious backlash within their caucus once they get specific. they also won't be specific about medicare. they say they want "cuts" but they won't say what those are. if they want to get serious, they have to get real. >> senator mcconnell said raising the eligibility age and having wealthy seniors pay more. there were some specifics, but you seem to be right with

regards to not a great deal of specificity. >> that's right. and these he's got, they have to get concrete. offer/counteroffer and so on down the line. but it's a political dance. see, the dilemma here and this is why we may well go into january is that it will be much easier for speaker boehner to have the taxes voted on then when his caucus is voting on theoretically a tax decrease because, of course, on january 1, all the taxes go back to the -- >> did you just say go off the cliff, did you just say you think we'd go off the cliff? >> i think there's better than 50/50 chance that we'll be into the first week of january before the tax part is resolved and i think that's largely because of the practical problems that the speaker faces. >> democratic congressman peter welch, thank you for spending so much time with us on a saturday, sir. >> thank you. coming up, we'll bring you the latest on an apparent

murder/suicide involving an nfl player earlier today. and up next, what if news stations, stations played a leading role in getting out the vote? believe it or not, some are doing just that. our big idea, next. [ male announcer ] take dayquil... [ ding! ] ...and spend time on the slopes. take alka-seltzer plus cold & cough... [ buzz! ] ...and spend time on the chair. for non-drowsy 6-symptom cold & flu relief. take dayquil. use nyquil d... [ ding! ] ...and get longer nighttime cough relief. use tylenol cold multisymptom nighttime... [ coughs ] [ buzz! ] [ screams ] ...and you could find yourself... honey? ...on the couch. nyquil d. 50% longer cough and stuffy nose relief.

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rides to polling sites, clearly none of it was done in vain. jointing me now ben my family votes for those of who you are nonspanish speaking out there. ben, good to see you, again. >> it's a pleasure. thank you for having me. >> do news stations risk being seen as partisan through these get out the vote efforts given that the majority of hispanics vote democrat? >> not necessarily. i mean, quite frankly, i mean, we should not be looking at the latinos as democratic voters. i mean, quite frankly, latinos register like any other citizens. and it seems to me like at this particular time it looks like the democratic fighters are doing a much better work than the republican side because the republican side has dedicated the last two decades, in my opinion, to start attacking the community, whether they're embracing us. >> so, you see nothing wrong with news stations driving voters to polls?

>> well, quite frankly, what the news is, i would say it's not the news station itself. it is the spanish networks who are helping us to ensure that the community understand the rights and the responsibilities that we have when we go to the polling places. so, what they do is nothing more than what they have done in the past. they continue informing the community, embracing the community under issues and encouraging us to participate. >> now that latinos have spoken, let's look down the road for a moment. according to "new york times" today, in today's "times" some 310,000 dreamers have applied for president obama's deferred action program. of course, a program that grants them work permits and gives them a reprieve from deportation. first of all, is that 310,000 number, is that more or less or about the same number that you thought would have applied for the program? and do you think they continue

to keep up the political pressure on the president? >> well, the first part. i think that the more, the more dreamers are going to start applying. i mean, keep in mind, it was risky when obama /romney were in campaign. you had one candidate that was threatening to not continue with the program. so, it was kind of hard to go and apply. you did not know if you could put yourself in the list of legalization and coming out of the shadows and you put your name on the list of deportations. so, number one. number two, i just think that this defer act and the image that we have with the youth and the dreamers, specifically, is definitely going to continue the momentum, not only because of the work that we have done in the past, but because of the expectations that we have from the obama administration to fix the immigration laws once and for all and we do expect that, at this particular time, congress and senators will also follow suit because we are tired

of waiting and too much talk has been happening and while our families are suffering, so, this is going to continue. this is a battle that we're going to have. we expect actions from the politicians and this coming year. if not, in 2014, they're going to hear from us, again. >> ben monterosa, thank you, sir. always a pleasure. >> thank you. coming up, what the latest move by the u.n. to recognize palestine means for the future of a real two-state solution. plus -- >> it bring these that want to kill us all. >> south carolina senator lindsey graham. who is he talking about there on the floor of the u.s. senate? the answer and the issue surrounding that debate, that sound bite coming up. you're watching msnbc, the place for politics. ♪ don't know what i'd do ♪ i'd have nothing to prove ♪ i'd have nothing to lose

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missouri. police there say at this point it appears to be a murder/suicide involving a 25-year-old nfl player. nbc news at this point can't confirm that belcher is the player involved. he allegedly killed his 22-year-old girlfriend at the house they shared with their 3-month-old daughter follow that horrible scene, a short time later, he reportedly committed suicide in a parking lot near the kansas city chiefs arrowhead stadium. a developing story we continue to follow here at msnbc. some other stories making news right now. two people are dead after a tour bus crashed into an overpass at miami international airport. three others taken to a hospital. they are in critical condition. the driver was not familiar with the area. former president george h.w. bush remains in stable condition at a houston hospital. the 88-year-old is being treated for a lingering cough-related

bronchitis. the 41st president has been in and out of the hospital recently from complications resulting from bronchitis. and still no word on who bought the second winning powerball ticket in arizona, although a lot of attention is being paid to this guy. he was in a maryland convenience store, he claimed to have the winning ticket and then he ran out. we haven't seen or heard from him since. the united nations general assembly voted thursday to recognize palestine as a nonmember observer state. the news was received with celebration in the west bank, but, palestinians face a harsh reality. their borders are mostly controlled by israel. they have competing governments in the west bank and gaza. what's ahead for palestinians and israelis now? let's bring in nbc correspondent martin fletcher who has covered this region longer than any other journalist in the world.

just after the u.n. vote, israel and jewish settlements in the west bank and jerusalem. what does that say about israel's intentions moving forward? >> well, nothing very good, i guess. the reason they did that is that they were very, very angry that the united nations general assembly approved of the palestinians as an observer, nonvoting state. and israel's response was to say that that was a way of getting around, getting out of the peace process. preempting with the negotiations. israel said there was a great pressure on the israeli government to respond in some way. and what they did was come up with this way of saying, we'll build 3,000 more homes on the land that will be, that the palestinians claim is theirs and it will be the subject of future peace negotiations, if they take place. so, israel said you do to the united nations what we do here

on the disputed land. it's a major, it's a major blow for the palestinians because 3,000 homes in an area which is about 4.5 square miles near jerusalem, effective lly splits that part of the west bank into two. for the palestinians, it's a bad move and now, of course, they're accusing israel of bad faith. >> martin fletcher, our man in tel aviv, thank you, sir, appreciate your reporting, as always. for more perspective, let's bring in msnbc contributor and also a journalist and filmmaker, as well. born in israel and grew up in arab east jerusalem, as well. we should note, good saturday to you. >> thank you. >> white house friday critical of the netanyahu government plan to add those new homes to settlements. white house statement in part that the plan was counterproductive. secretary of state hillary clinton also spoke yesterday. i want to play this sound and then talk about it on the other side. take a listen. >> let me reiterate that this administration, like previous

administrations, has been very clear with israel. and these activities set back the cause of a negotiated peace. >> are settlements the biggest between israel and the palestinians? >> definitely. definitely they are endangering the peace process. they're actually endangering more and more israel because what the message, the message that they send is whatever you will do in a diplomatic peaceful way like with the u.n. bid, we don't care about that. we are above the lull and we're gone building more and more land. let's remember 1993, oslo agreement. israeli signs, they recognize that palestinians deserve 22% of the land and since then until today 60 settlements and today 200 settlements, half million israelis are living in a contested land within the east bank and jerusalem. >> what is the next step moving forward? >> change of leaders.

we need barack obama or man like the u.s. president or somebody like nelson mandela to be the pm in israel that actually think about the next generation and not the next election, which is what netanyahu is doing. he ran on a platform. no negotiation, no settlement, we don't see the palestinian suffering. we don't care. we're above the lull and we'll drag everybody along that path. >> you wrote in "the daily beast" that it will be a nightmare for israel. a legal nightmare. >> a legal nightmare. what israel doesn't understand that no one today can do anything without being investigated by the international criminal court. i mean, joining the -- being recognized as a palatine as a nonmember state and it will allow them to join all the organization under the umbrella of the united nations and one of them is the international criminal court. what they are doing today, they will be investigated. whatever they will do in west

bank, gaza and jerusalem, being investigated. even the illegal settlements because these settlements are considered by the international community standards illegal. they will be investigated and they're officials. netanyahu opened the door for their officials, their idf soldiers to be actually one day investigated and indicted by the international criminal court. remember, libya, the whole game changed after gadhafi and his son where an arrest warrant by the international criminal court. >> thank you so much. >> thank you. >> always appreciate it. now, to the supreme court where high court watchers were eagerly awaiting a decision yesterday on whether the justices would hear a case on the constitution nality of the defensive marriage act as well as california's anti-same-sex proposition 8. as pete williams tells us now, we'll have to wait a little longer. >> craig, it was quite an

anti-climax friday. waiting all day expecting we'd hear something from the supreme court on what they would take and an order's list that had just two cases on that had to do with patents and pan patenting n genes. it's impossible to know for sure. quite likely that the justices want more time to discuss these cases. so, they'll reschedule this for perhaps their next closed door conference which is this coming friday. that sometimes happens. the voting rights act case, for example, which was granted earlier in november. they put on several successive lists before they finally decided to grant it. so, that's one possibility. it's also possible that they're not going to take some of these cases. but on friday, all the supreme court announces is cases that it will grant, not cases it will deny. we'll get the denials list that's ready this coming monday. so, that will be the next place where we'll watch to the see whether they denied any of these cases and it's also not out of

the realm of possibility, though it would be nulunusual, that th want to grant any of these cases, as well. we don't get the grants and we'll wail until next friday and do all of this, again. we can't tell at this point exactly what this means. the supreme court justices know, but only they know where they stand on these cases. we're simply going to have to wait until monday at the earliest and maybe a little more time to find out whether they will or not take up the main cases we're watching for, the challenge to california's proposition 8 and the challenge to the federal defensive marriage act. so, we'll be back here monday. craig, back to you. >> pete williams from the supreme court there, thank you very much. so, with more potentially big news coming from the high court in just a couple of days, we want to get an insider's perspective on the latest developments. my next guest is the man just for that, not only clerk for justice steven brier back in 1995, he argued before the supreme court itself in the

famous case back in 2006. harvard and stanford law professor, kevin russell. good to have you with us, kevin. >> thank you. >> confusion on the fact that we didn't hear anything from the high court yesterday. how should we interpret that right now as we move into next week? positive, negative, why? >> well, i think it's inevitable that the court is going to take the case. the supreme court has a very strong tradition of taking cases where federal courts strike down federal statutes and that's what happened in this case. i think we can take as a given that the court is using this time to pick which of the multiple petitions out of multiple cases it is picking the best case for deciding that. part of which involves a question of which case will involve justice kagan having to recuse herself or not. >> because she was solicitor general at the time the case was brought. >> that's right.

>> if the supreme court does rule on the defensive marriage act or prop 8, which justices do you believe stand in favor of same-sex marriage versus their conservative counterparts? >> well, i think this is one of those issues that breaks down pretty much liberal conservative. justices alina kagan, sote sota-meyer. this is going to be justice kenne kennedy's case as it often is and he has in several cases cast his vote with the liberals. >> thank you so much. harvard and stanford law school professor. great to have you on. hope to have you back again, sir. >> my pleasure. straight ahead, bo knows trees. the first dog. that's right. our favorite dog gives us a tour of the holiday decorations at the white house.

up next, though, why rush limbaugh regrets bringing up sandra flicks name. try running four.ning a restaurant is hard, fortunately we've got ink. it gives us 5x the rewards on our internet, phone charges and cable, plus at office supply stores. rewards we put right back into our business. this is the only thing we've ever wanted to do and ink helps us do it. make your mark with ink from chase.

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oh ! the windows phone 8x by htc on verizon. it features easy to navigate live tiles that are simple to customize. just pin what matters most right to your homescreen. exclusively with data sense-- a feature that makes the most of you plan. only on verizon. time now for a little trail mix along with a holiday peek at america's canine in chief. ♪ >> we love that dog. we can't get enough of that dog. that is the first family's dog, bo. making the rounds of the white house and inspecting all the decorations, including the tree. look at how big bo has gotten, too. that has to be a dream for any dog. by the way, is that a douglas fir? someone tweet me, let me know.

david axelrod going to get rid of his signature mustache here live on msnbc this coming friday. not for sweeps, for a good cause. made a bet with joe scarborough saying he would shave his upper lift if mitt romney won minnesota but axelrod said he would go through with it if they raised $1 million for his charity. and they did. president obama and mitt romney using the photo from their lunch house meeting as inspiration. here's a sample of that conversation. mitt romney, so, this is it, huh? the oval office? seems kind of small. president obama, we make the best of it. so, you really ordered up fireworks on election night, huh? governor romney, yeah, something like that. where did you even find all those people?

it was like you had nasa labs cloning obama voters for the last four years. you can read the rest on "rolling stone's" website there. that is the only snippet we can put on the air. rush limbaugh erupting over sandra fluke this time the women's rights activist is a contender for "time" magazine's person of the year. in february you might remember mr. limbaugh calling fluke calling prostitute on his radio show. here's what he says now. >> nobody would know who she is if it weren't for me. if anybody is going to be named person of the year on that basis, it ought to be me! >> no word from "time" magazine whether rush is being considered. she is about to step down from her job as secretary of state. what will senator clinton do as encore and will it include another race for the white house? we'll talk to two people who

have covered clinton for years. their insight into hillary's move, next. sometimes what we suffer from is bigger than we think ... like the flu. with aches, fever and chills- the flu's a really big deal. so why treat it like it's a little cold? there's something that works differently than over-the-counter remedies. prescription tamiflu attacks the flu virus at its source. so don't wait. call your doctor right away. tamiflu is prescription medicine for treating the flu in adults and children one year and older whose flu symptoms started within the last two days. before taking tamiflu tell your doctor if you're pregnant, nursing. have serious health conditions,

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it's become somewhat of a parlor game this election cycle. we enjoy playing ate lot here. will she or won't she in 2016? we all know i'm talking about hillary clinton and whether she'll run for president. the secretary of state is one of the leading democrats whose name is being floated around. but she has repeatedly brushed off the speculations, and now that it's clear she is giving up her cabinet position, what will she do next? i'd like to washer roll lewis, and beth fui, senior editor for politics and news at yahoo. thanks for sticking around, folks. you both covered hillary for a number of years, since her time as a senator here in new york.

i know you're making your own speculations, perhaps participating in some office pool even. michelle cottle of the daily beast spoke with analysts who suggest that a presidential run would inevitably complicate hillary's advocacy work and risk tarnishing her shimmering global brand, even if it ultimately opened up greater possibilities. errol, is that a fair hypothesis? >> it's a fair hypothesis, but it's exactly the kind of risk she has been taking her entire life. you mentioned an office pool. it would be the easiest money you could make would be to assume unless you see something otherwise written in stone you have to assume that she is going to run for president. she has spent her entire life, her entire life, even before she became an adult of trying to learn more about the major issues of the day and have an impact on them. she has been in the white house and seen what you can do, whether it's, you know, don't ask don't tell or welfare reform, how you can move the mighty levers that only the white house has control over. to assume now that she wants to

be thought well of and sit in some foundation office, i don't think so. >> and beth, you've got to think that bill clinton is probably not talking her out of it. >> bill clinton would love hillary clinton to be president. in fact, the fact that he was so magnanimous with president obama this past campaign was a miracle to a lot of us who covered hillary clinton in '08 because i think the president, bill clinton took his wife's loss harder than she did in that campaign against then senator obama. look, what i think is going to happen is hillary has all the cards to her. she is going to take a year off. she can sleep. she can write a book. she can do speaking appearances. she can be a mom to chelsea. >> maybe a grandmom. >> maybe a grandma. i don't know anything about that. and she can still decide to run. this is going to kill all these other democrats who are hoping to run because the field is frozen until she makes a decision. >> i want to talk to you about that, because you raise an interesting point there are a lot of folks who are suggesting one of the reasons we spend so much time talking about hillary

ad nauseam is because there really aren't a whole lot of other democrats out there who could run and have a chance of winning. >> don't tell that to andrew cuomo there are a lot of people out there who are regarding their position as essentially frozen until -- >> the list is deep? >> the list of ambitious young politicians is deep. keep in mind, craig, every single state senator who is a democrat out there thinks they can do what state senator barack obama did in 2004, a meteoric rise to the top. >> and not just young. look at joe biden. don't you think he wants to run? he is the vice president. and yet he is stuck in place until hillary clinton makes her decision. >> it would be fascinating. you've got to think that if joe biden and hillary clinton both decided they were going to do it, there would be a conversation had that, no, you think they would potentially run against each other. >> no. i think it's hillary's at this point to decide. >> but i so enjoyed having both you guys. i hope you come back. don't spend your saturdays at home with your families watching football or something, come back

and be a part of this. >> thank you. >> beth, errol, thanks again. coming up, could the end be near for the war on terror? new indications from the administration precisely on that. and what lead a republican senatorer to say the words, quote, crazy bastards on the senate floor? his words, not mine. lindsey graham. i'll tell you why he said it in a few minutes. you're watching msnbc, a case for politics and occasional profanity on a saturday afternoon. so now i can be in the scene. advair is clinically proven to help significantly improve lung function. unlike most copd medications, advair contains both an anti-inflammatory and a long-acting bronchodilator working together to help improve your lung function all day. advair won't replace fast-acting inhalers for sudden symptoms

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